Unfortunately, living in Japan I'm not in any position to boycott the NHL but fuck this season. I hope every arena is a quarter full for the whole season and all of the banana league teams have to fold.

I'd bet with about 99.99% certainty that every game played here in Vancouver gets sold out, or very close to it. In fact I'd bet that's true for most Canadian cities. I'm afraid the banana league teams have already saved a half season of salaries, so I doubt many will be folding this season. Personally I couldn't give a care, I'll catch the occasional Canucks game on TV and I'll continue to attend Heat and Giants games.

The LA Kings, not only better on the ice than everyone else, but also better off the ice than anyone else:

@LAKingsAs a thank you for fans' patience, #LAKings are donating $1 million back to the LA community.

They have a long way to go to catch up to the Canucks; the Sedin twins alone donated 1 million to the Childrens Hospital here. The rest of the team floats McDonald House (hospice for terminally ill children and their parents) pretty much on their wallets alone.But good on Willy, Donut, Brown and the rest of the organization for giving back to the community.

The LA Kings, not only better on the ice than everyone else, but also better off the ice than anyone else:

@LAKingsAs a thank you for fans' patience, #LAKings are donating $1 million back to the LA community.

They have a long way to go to catch up to the Canucks; the Sedin twins alone donated 1 million to the Childrens Hospital here. The rest of the team floats McDonald House (hospice for terminally ill children and their parents) pretty much on their wallets alone.But good on Willy, Donut, Brown and the rest of the organization for giving back to the community.

The truth of the matter is many teams and players within the hockey world do considerable good work in the communities, I don't think we need to get into a pissing match about who does more, but rather be proud of a sport that does so much to give back.

The LA Kings, not only better on the ice than everyone else, but also better off the ice than anyone else:

@LAKingsAs a thank you for fans' patience, #LAKings are donating $1 million back to the LA community.

They have a long way to go to catch up to the Canucks; the Sedin twins alone donated 1 million to the Childrens Hospital here. The rest of the team floats McDonald House (hospice for terminally ill children and their parents) pretty much on their wallets alone.But good on Willy, Donut, Brown and the rest of the organization for giving back to the community.

The truth of the matter is many teams and players within the hockey world do considerable good work in the communities, I don't think we need to get into a pissing match about who does more, but rather be proud of a sport that does so much to give back.

Fair enough, its just that their public generosity is 1 of the few things I like about the Canucks these days. As well, getting into a pissing match does allow us to highlight those players and organizations that are notable in in their generosity with $ and time. Lest we ever forget there's the other side of the coin - cheap ass players like Yashin, who promise a million and only follow through on a fraction of it. Here's to you Alexi!

And to correct the misconception, this is the Kings ownership (AEG) and McDonalds donating $1M on TOP of their normal community outreach (of which many of the Kings are huge contributors of) as their penance for the lockout. This isn't PR for business as usual. This isn't the players doing their normal thing (which is great, btw). This is the Kings going 'instead of giving you bullshit like email apologies, $.50 concessions, etc... we are going to donate an additional $1M to charity as an apology.' This is by far the best apology from a team that I've seen and makes any qualms I had (I had very little, to be honest) of supporting this organization after the lockout disappear. Good on them.

Guys. GUYS. Why are you even arguing? Your teams are minor league compared to what Jeremy Jacobs is doing. He's giving THREE FREE (non-alcoholic) CONCESSIONS to each fan for every game in January. I'm buying a ticket to every game because there's no way I will ever get three free $10 hot dogs again.

Guys. GUYS. Why are you even arguing? Your teams are minor league compared to what Jeremy Jacobs is doing. He's giving THREE FREE (non-alcoholic) CONCESSIONS to each fan for every game in January. I'm buying a ticket to every game because there's no way I will ever get three free $10 hot dogs again.

Guys. GUYS. Why are you even arguing? Your teams are minor league compared to what Jeremy Jacobs is doing. He's giving THREE FREE (non-alcoholic) CONCESSIONS to each fan for every game in January. I'm buying a ticket to every game because there's no way I will ever get three free $10 hot dogs again.

Guys. GUYS. Why are you even arguing? Your teams are minor league compared to what Jeremy Jacobs is doing. He's giving THREE FREE (non-alcoholic) CONCESSIONS to each fan for every game in January. I'm buying a ticket to every game because there's no way I will ever get three free $10 hot dogs again.

WOW that's pretty dam sad! Even the cubic millimeter of generosity Mr. Jacobs is offering, would evaporate for me with the Non-Alcoholic part! The Canucks have so many automatons/fans dying to see a game, that I'm betting about all they'll offer is opening the doors 5 minutes earlier so the die-hards won't have to stand out in the cold so long. The Canuck's Management are so pwnd by the Abbotsford Heat and Vancouver Giants in fan appreciation, it's not even funny.

The funny thing I wasn't even going to bother with Game Center this year since my travel is down and I have Center Ice at home... but at $50 whatever, I'll keep it.

I switched to GameCenter over Center Ice because of the lack of HD options on cable. HD hockey wins for me.

Heh - I moved to DirecTV years ago because when Comcast started carrying HD Center Ice feeds, they went full retard and still only offered 10 channels. The first ten channels. One of which was HD, one was SD... so five games. So any of the PST start games were... actually not at all available on Comcast. AT ALL. Idiots.

DirecTV gives me every Center Ice channel, home/away feeds, all in HD if available (so for some reason, not one of the Canadian broadcasters). I wish I could consolidate on just GameCenter (mobile/traveling is great, as is the condensed games), but I found their video feed less optimal versus Center Ice when I was watching on my TV, which I guess is to be expected. Also I found Game Center had weird outages last year, whereas Center Ice was rock solid.

The funny thing I wasn't even going to bother with Game Center this year since my travel is down and I have Center Ice at home... but at $50 whatever, I'll keep it.

I switched to GameCenter over Center Ice because of the lack of HD options on cable. HD hockey wins for me.

Heh - I moved to DirecTV years ago because when Comcast started carrying HD Center Ice feeds, they went full retard and still only offered 10 channels. The first ten channels. One of which was HD, one was SD... so five games. So any of the PST start games were... actually not at all available on Comcast. AT ALL. Idiots.

DirecTV gives me every Center Ice channel, home/away feeds, all in HD if available (so for some reason, not one of the Canadian broadcasters). I wish I could consolidate on just GameCenter (mobile/traveling is great, as is the condensed games), but I found their video feed less optimal versus Center Ice when I was watching on my TV, which I guess is to be expected. Also I found Game Center had weird outages last year, whereas Center Ice was rock solid.

Anyway I'm glad they discounted things as heavily as they did.

Unfortunately, where I live, my only TV option is Cox Cable, so it's GameCenter or nothing if I want out of market games in HD. Unless they've added HD capability in the last few months and I've missed out on it.

I am spending an exorbitant amount of money to watch a piece of cloth be raised to the roof of a building on Saturday.

Can't wait!

I live down here in So Cal and would have LOVED to have gone, but the tickets were just a bit too pricey and sold out very fast. Have a blast at the event!!! Post some pics as I will have to live vicariously through you!

1st period: Wow, the Avs look pretty good.2nd period: Oh, good lord!!!! How do you collapse that quickly?3rd period: I'll keep watching, but I know you're not coming back to win.

All the penalties the Avs got in the second period were just back breaking. Two double minors during the second period. I think they basically had something like 12 minutes of penalties in the period. Also were down 5-3 with two men in the box and got scored on there.

Not expecting great things this year, but was hoping for better than that undisciplined mess.

Meh, I always say wait 20 games into a season before you start getting excited about or bemoaning your team's performance. This season is only 48 games long so make that 12 games now. So with that in mind, most teams aren't even half way to that number yet. It's a short season, but there's still lots of hockey left.